29 January 2013

I'm so glad
this site is being re-launched, I loved the 123 challenges. :) Remember these ones I blogged about recently? There was a pastel + 'sweet' + wire challenge where I did a layout of my mum's totally classy wedding dress, and a school bus yellow + paper strips + 'miss' challenge where I chose to scrap a shot of hubby's childhood front yard... which made my sister in law cry... sorry Deb :(The 123 Design Team is being announced over the coming weeks.... looks like we are set for some awesome inspiration!

Please share this post and spread the word! You can subscribe via the blog and Like the 123 Facebook page too.

27 January 2013

It's a colour challenge this month over at Kraft it Up... ooooh, bright and summery! Love these colours together. :)

I had this pic of Holly on my desk in the 'to scrap' pile and figured the colour of her cozzie matched the blue of this pretty colour combo. Isn't she a classy lady? Forever picking her undies (and cozzies) out of her butt, slopping food on herself, getting around nude, hiding in the dog kennel, picking her nose... you name it - if it's gross or grotty, she's into it!

24 January 2013

I LOVE peeking into other people's crafty spaces, don't you? I figured that now that it's relatively tidy and I've just recently rearranged the furniture, perhaps it's my turn to share my scrap room with you. :)

Whilst I love pinning gorgeous craft rooms on Pinterest with their perfectly matched storage and huge vintage tables and all the pretty trimmings and thinking 'Yeah, I'll totally have that one day', and styling it all in my head, and picking out paint colours at Bunnings, the other half of my brain (the REALIST half) knows that I'm lucky to have a dedicated craft space at all, and perhaps I should shut the hell up and be happy with half an office that's painted a nasty bright pink.

Rather than painting (coz I hate house painting!) I figured I'd try and work with the nasty pink, and added aqua, white and a bit of dark pink to try and make it work together. So, heres my little space...

I've had my craft table for YEARS (like since high school) and it's kinda ugly but very well
loved, just a cheapo pre-loved dining table that I don't mind getting
paint on. The blue table is a new addition. Well, new to me anyway - my
mum has owned it since she was a little girl and learnt to sew at this
table, so when she said she was chucking it out I had to save it.

The unfortunate grilles on the windows are there because the room looks out onto the pool, which is nice, but I do wish we didn't need those bars! I will make some curtains eventually.

Underneath mum's table I have some storage; my stepdad Jimmy's old work suitcase, and his mother's old bread bins which are now my waste paper bins.

I love having my sewing machine out as opposed to packed away under the desk where it was previously - expect to see lots more sewing on layouts! The little Ikea chest of drawers is empty at the moment and might not stay in the room if I don't find a use for it - I've had the thing for probably 15 years; and I'm sure I can find a use for it elsewhere in our home. Otherwise it will get painted and covered in pretty paper. :)

Over on my desk, I have a birdcage full of doilies (because occasionally I sew garlands with them), my heat gun at the ready because I use it a LOT, and a jar for random scraps, as well as an old whisky crate I found in my Pa's garage and a small drawer from the Junkyard that I cleaned up and lined with pretty paper. There's just my bucket list in there at the moment, but I'm planning to fill it with more mini books. :)

In Pa's old crate is an old (and seriously heavy) Department of Education microscope which is a bookend for my bills and things, my homemade pincushion (teacup + fabric + stuffing + stones to weigh it down) and my camera USB cable because I use it nearly every day! On top is an antique spool and an antique baby's hairbrush I bought for Holly when she was born.

On my wall, I thought I'd make a little feature with washi tape instead of having a pinboard - mine fell apart (another homemade job, made from a big padded post bag covered with fabric) and although I'll be keeping an eye out for one of these vintage cake racks, my washi tape grid looks kinda pretty for now. And surprisingly it hasn't peeled off the wall yet, after 8 weeks.

On the wall you can see my layouts from Lou's class, my 'create' canvas (thanks to the lovely Miss Lisa Oxley) and the old sign is a reproduction one from Typo (ten bucks - bargain!).

I have been trying to convince Richard that he doesn't really need to be in the office anymore, considering he uses his computer maybe once a week now that he has an iPad, and maybe he could donate that space to me for storage, however despite my best efforts he was not to be swayed.

Instead he helped me put some shelves in the built in wardrobe to store all my crap, which was very nice of him, considering we were kid-free that day and he could easily have parked his arse on the lounge and watched the baseball instead.

Note the little pile of baby clothes to sell on ebay that I haven't quite got around to listing yet - too busy crafting :)

Beautifully styled, isn't it? LOL. I love seeing how people store their stuff though, that's why I'm sharing my clutter pics! Right up the top of the cupboard is a paper trimmer I never use because it's bent (I use scissors for EVERYTHING), and a giant bag of fabric, and a giant box of fabric as well (maybe I should do some more sewing soon?).

Down the left hand side I have photos, notebooks (I have a notebook problem!) and my camera gear in the top boxes, then ribbon in the wicker boxes. I store my ribbon in big zip-lock bags by colour.

Under that is stock for the RaineCloud shop, under that is an assortment of sewing things, cards, paper, patterns, textas (I had a Tria marker addiction when I was studying fashion design - they're kind of like Copics), and right down the bottom is a storage tub full of gift wrapping stuff.

On the right hand side, everything that's 12x12 size is on the top shelf, including my alpahs and stickers in lever arch files, and underneath are a few Sistema containers from Woolies full of bling, inks and paints, one for flowers, one for random mixed media bits and one for stamps (zoom in... look at how I store my stamps, shocking isn't it?! They're all bent and just chucked in there willy nilly, bent and squashed... the horror!). :)

The little red tin lunch box holds my chipboard bits and the alphabet print box is full of DL size envelopes which are filled with all my little miscellaneous bits and pieces - one for vintage playing cards, one for shipping tags, one for metal charms, one for tickets, and whatever else doesn't fit into any other spot.

Under that lot is two big black boxes of doilies and vintage linens, my big Artbin which I keep empty for taking my gear to scrap nights, a bit of random junk and a storage tub full of stationery.

It ain't that pretty, it's certainly not magazine-worthy (or Pinterest-worthy for that matter), but it's mine and I *love* having a little space to call my own amongst the whirlwind of mess in the rest of the house... and it's a damn sight better than my craft space in our old house!

18 January 2013

I haven't had a go at Ronda Palazzari'sOne Little Word challenges before but I seem to be on a roll this month and was looking for another challenge to participate in... and this month's word, RESOLUTIONS, resonated with me.

Now, I'm not being negative, I'm just being honest when I say that I DON'T make New Years resolutions, because for me anyway, they are a bit of a crock based on the emotional high of a new year and not based in reality and therefore unsustainable and destined to flop. I like to make resolutions in the middle of the year, or at other random times, and I generally make sure I've done a bit of soul searching first to make sure I don't want to change something based on an emotional decision. That sounds a bit wanky, but I'm sticking to it. :)

This year however, I think the timing was just serendipitous... I'm attemping to get stronger and be less stressed and if I lose some weight along the way, that's cool, but mostly I just want to feel a bit more centered. So I have started personal training a few times a week, and am walking with the dog on the other days. And I have discovered I kind of like running! WTF, I know, SOOOO not anything I ever thought I would do. I'm not an exercising person. I'm the dork who sat on the side of the oval at high school, preferring to write lines rather than have to play hockey. "Forgetting" my sports uniform once again. Emphasising my total lack of co-ordination so nobody would pick me for a team. It's TOTALLY not my thing. I don't do sport.

So it's come as a total surprise to me that I enjoy running. I'm still crap at it, I've only been training for 3 weeks, but I've signed up for the Mothers Day Classic (8km) and the City to Surf (14km) this year, so I'd better get my butt in gear!

Have you made a resolution this year? And have you scrapped it? Do share!

09 January 2013

I have seen a lot of creative peeps doing a top 10 post so I thought I'd jump on the bandwagon too... and I just like reminiscing :)

I think I'm FINALLY developing my own style after, like, 6 years of trying to replicate other scrapper's beautiful work that I LOVE to look at, but I could never quite produce a similar thing myself. :( I think I've been finding my feet in the scrappy world for quite a long time! Did it take that long for you?! Or am I just a bit slow :)

These days I don't try to scraplift anything much at all... I'm constantly inspired by others but I know if I try and recreate someone else's work it won't turn out right and I'll get cranky. So despite the fact that I love flowery shabby layouts, I know they're not my style and I just can't do them, and I love immaculately clean lines and straight edges, I know that's not me either 'cause I'm too impatient to use a craft knife (I don't even own a paper trimmer). Scissors all the way baby!

So now, it feels good to know that most times I'm going to like what turns out on the page because it is coming naturally from somewhere in my brain!

Anyway, here's my fave layouts of the past year, in no particular order... each pic clicks through to its original post for some close-ups.

Would you like some more 2012 round-ups from some of my favourite awesomely creative people? Here's a few links to some wonderful eye candy... check 'em out, these guys are AMAZING. :)

05 January 2013

I've admired this challenge blog for ages, especially all the gorgeous mixed media inspiration going on there, but I've never participated in a challenge till now, partly 'cause I'm not so good at following sketches, but this one caught my eye so I gave it a go!

Instead of using stars as embellies I've used them in the background (with this very old kinda ugly Bella paper... part of my mission to Scrap my Crap :)

Lots of mess and splats going on... and some tissue paper and white paint layers to tone down the star print...

I luv this pic of Holly.... she's got such a cheesy grin :)

The tag behind the photo turned out kinda cool... I've used some pink Mister Hueys and some brown Glimmer Glaze then stamped some stars with clear embossing powder. This has masked them so when I sprayed the blue Dylusions over the top the red/pink embossed areas show up really well.

Stay COOL everyone, it's the kind of week where I wish our giant air conditioner was working... heading for 38 degrees Celsius on Tuesday for Tyler's 5th birthday, oh joy!! I think we'll be in the pool ALL day.

03 January 2013

I love being on leave from work.... so much more time to scrap! I've managed to fit in a January challenge already! :)

The challenge at Scrap the Boys this month is to use a photo of your son's favourite summer or holiday activity and use it to inspire your layout.

The first thing that came to mind for me was swimming... Tyler has hardly been out of the pool the last month or so and has all of a sudden got comfortable in the water - he LOVES jumping and will just jump time and time again, spinning around and doing pin drops and bombs, and the other night he even woke me up to tell me he was practicing diving in his sleep!

I'm not sure what the background cardstock is but the blue & domino patterned paper is Crate Paper which I have inked, painted, smooshed around and embossed then cut into bits.

I wasn't planning on doing a December Daily, or a Journal Your Christmas project, or anything of the sort. This festive season I was so stressed out with the combined effort and organising and co-ordination required for my brother's December wedding weekend near Newcastle, hubby's work Christmas weekend away at Ettalong, daycare parties, daycare graduation, Dad's Christmas in Newcastle (again) and my hubby's family Christmas at our place - all 4 December weekends full amongst the usual busyness of the season.

So WTF was I thinking when I started this little 6x6 project? Stress relief! I was kind of avoiding all that organising and preparing (and cleaning) and hiding in my craft room doing something fun.

But mostly, I was totally inspired by Ashli Oliver's posts and pics of her beautiful Christmas album that I figured halfway through the month that I'd give it a go myself. I love how she has made it interactive and cut up the page protectors to slot bits in and there's lots of stitching and messiness and movement.

Mine is a work in progress - 19 pages down and I haven't got to any of the kids yet, just Richard and my childhood memories! - so I've ordered 2 more packs of page protectors, and fished out lots more bits from my paper scraps box. This is a great project to use up lots of little pieces! I just wanted to share what I have done so far:

There will be a lot of journalling because so far I've only found one Christmas photo of Richard when he was little, and I really want to make this about 'our Christmas', so will have to grill him about his childhood memories to fill in the blanks. :)

I like this page below - I've cut a slit in the page protector so I can tuck in some of the lists I write every Christmas; I'm a hard-core list maker anyway but at Christmas it just gets out of hand LOL.

I'll probably rearrange the pages a bit too - my little man is just getting into Lego so this shot of my brother and I in 1990 would make a good companion page for one about Ty's Lego that he just received from his aunties.

Now I am up to the memories Richard and I have together, and next will come the kids.

So stay tuned for the remaining pages which I'll share next month! :) If you've done a Christmas journal for 2012 feel free to share a link in the comments, I'd love to take a look!

For now, I'm feeling very philosophical and positive (as most people are on the first day of the year)... let me just say my word for the year is POW! which is mostly going to translate into some healthy changes!